THE PROBLEM
17 SaaS subscriptions, three duplicates, two never logged into.
The founder couldn't fully list what they were paying for. The accountant had a column in the P&L called 'software' and it was the second-biggest non-COGS line.
Two tools had been bought during a launch year ago and forgotten. Three tools overlapped on features the team only used one of. Klaviyo and Postscript ran two versions of the same flow.
HOW WE RAN IT
One week. Every tool. Every workflow. A doc the founder can act on Monday.
Day 1–2: list every tool. Billing cycle, contract end date, real cost with overages, who inside the team owns it.
Day 3–4: map what each tool actually does. Where they overlap. Which workflows have no tool at all.
Day 5–7: write the recommendations. Per tool: keep, consolidate (move to something they already pay for), rebuild, or cancel outright. Plus a price quote for the top 2 rebuilds if they want to go further with us.
I cancelled three subscriptions the day I got the doc. The other two were the obvious rebuild candidates — we did one of them as the pilot.
THE OUTCOME
Stack cut in week one, workflow rebuilt by week eight.
- Tools in stack17 → 11−6
- Monthly SaaS bill−$11,000month one
- Annualized saving$132,000ongoing
- Workflows rebuilt as custom (pilot)0 → 1 (subscription flow)+1
- Time from audit doc to first cancellationSame day—
WHAT WE DID NOT TOUCH
Tools the audit said to keep — and why.
Shopify, Stripe, the 3PL software and the accountant's tools stayed untouched. The point of the audit isn't to rip-and-replace. It's to be honest about which tools earn their bill.
WHAT'S NEXT
The audit became the founder's quarterly habit.
The brand now runs a stack review every quarter using the template we built. The founder reports it has caught two creeping subscriptions and saved roughly $700/mo over the year since.